Jon Voight enjoyed a run of acclaimed roles in the 1970s but narrowly missed out on one of cinema's most celebrated parts, as he later revealed he had wanted the lead in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, only for the studio to cast Jack Nicholson instead. Voight, who had already earned an Oscar nomination for Midnight Cowboy and further acclaim for Deliverance, was offered Love Story as an alternative but turned it down for being "too corny", missing the chance to star in a film that swept five Academy Awards.

Voight was among Hollywood's most sought-after young actors following his breakthrough in Midnight Cowboy (1969) and follow-up successes in Catch-22 and Deliverance, but he lost the Cuckoo's Nest role to Nicholson, whose performance as Randle McMurphy became one of the decade's defining turns. He is also reported to have missed out on Jaws, though he disputed this, saying Spielberg instead offered him a different, similarly themed role. Voight's fortunes turned in 1978 when he won the Best Actor Oscar for Coming Home alongside co-star Jane Fonda's Best Actress win, before closing the decade with The Champ opposite Faye Dunaway.